The 'BIG' Christmas shop!

[greenishfing]

It always amazes me the amount of food some people buy for Christmas. When do they manage to eat it all? It's not as if the shops are shut for a week.
Yesterday my husband asked his brother and sister if they wanted taking to do their 'big' Christmas shop. They looked at him in puzzlement (bearing in mind they are coming to our house for Christmas Day). I also looked at him surprised as really the only difference to an ordinary shop for me will be a large joint of meat of some kind ( not turkey), a couple of extra bottles of wine, and extra cream to make lots of brandy cream to go with the Christmas pudding I made weeks ago. Most of our veg will come from the allotment and they are all very happy with homemade Yorkshire puddings for a starter. I'm sure everyone will enjoy their meal. If they don't they'll probably be too merry (p***ed) to notice.
We'll probably be living off leftovers for a few days afterwards.
Already customers are coming out of the supermarkets with more than one trolley full of stuff....
Do people really eat all this food or does lots get wasted?
Being tight I might pop down the local supermarket late Christmas Eve just to see if anything interesting is yellow stickered. One year I picked up a whole fresh duck for £3 (went in the freezer for New Year). Another year I bought a couple of large cartons of double cream for 10p each ( made it into butter) and best of all I was given a round of blue stilton that was going out of date that day. Maybe I shouldn't but I never eat blue cheese until I consider it ready (well after it's sell by date).

[greenishfing]

To add to the above. I have just been rooting out the Christmas decorations and found a box of Christmas Crackers I bought reduced after Christmas last year.

[mothhawk]

I think people are tempted by foodstuffs that are not generally on the shelves at other times, such as bags of mixed nuts in their shells, clementines/satsumas, chestnuts (whole, pureed, stuffing etc), fancy biscuits and crackers, fancy boxed chocs, prettily Christmas packaged stuff such as cheese, cold meats and pastries, mince pies, vol-au-vents, petit fours, and so on.

Then they are led on by tradition - we must have a ham to bake/pork pie/Christmas pudding and cake/pigs in blankets/crisps and crackers. Add the regular weekly or monthly shop, and bingo, enough food to feed a whole scout troop.

And yes, I would not be surprised to learn that a good amount is thrown away, even stuff that could be put in the freezer for use later in the year.

[Chestnut]

I like to pop in and look for yellow stickers on christmas eve too. Often good bargains on fresh stuff that won’t keep til boxing day. Got 4kg beef mince 75% off last year and made a load of lasagne, chilli etc for the freezer

[Jungle Jane]

My sisters doing dinner for eight of us,her trolley would be bigger than normal. A lot of people must do the same. I just buy a normal amount except I did pick up a load of chocolate gifts last time I went.

[Thelma Sanders]

I've got 6 more for Xmas and boxing day
The extras to my normal shop this month, are just extra milk, cream and salad stuff, plus a gammon, pork & apple sausages for stuffing and a pork rack from the butchers, to go with the usual veg from the plot.
I've bought extra flour and cake ingredients over the last couple of months, a few bottles of wine, and orange juice and sparkling water for the kids. (People seem to be fussy about their brands of beer, so will be bringing their own )

So not loads n loads more than usual and I'm expecting to put some left-overs in the freezer
I suppose that it's the younger folks who somehow never learnt to cook that buy all the ready made, expensive food...

[veggiechicken]

Yellow stickers for me if I have time on the 24th to go looking.
I like the surprise element in not knowing what I'll be eating on the 25th or any other day actually.

[Greenleaves]

Our only real extravagance is meat...Turkey, goose and gammon. We do hampers for our kids but that's capped at £50.

I was however a spendthrift today, purchased to whole salmon for £4 each....bargain in Asbo's, already portioned, vacuum packed and in the freezer

[veggiechicken]

Lucky you, GL.
Reminds me of the day in Morries, when there were a pile of reduced whole salmon in cook-in plastic bags.
I only wanted one but this "lady" elbowed her way in and grabbed all the salmon in her arms. The fishmonger told her that "This lady (that's me) wanted one and she couldn't have them all. He made a grab at the fish to take them off her, she grabbed them tighter and squeezed a fish out of its bag, straight onto the shop floor, where it slid its way across to the meat counter.
I didn't know whether to laugh or hide.

The fishmonger picked up the wandering salmon and asked the woman if she still wanted it!
She did so he washed it off and rebagged it. Must have been a bargain!
I made my escape with one salmon nestling in my trolley.

[Bren In Pots]

My extra shopping is 6 mince pies rest of the cart will be our normal shop, lamb with garden veg for Christmas day.

[Scarlet]

I rarely do huge shops these days but when you have to cater for big parties your regular food shop can more than double.

My neighbours come over at noon for fizz on the day, we usually have fancy buffet type food/nibbles... I like to enjoy the day too so I will often buy stuff in out of convenience that I would never normally buy with the added few luxury foods.
My Christmas dinner will be 10...we have that as an evening meal, then the same number for Boxing Day....breakfast & dinner.
I also have my two sons home from uni and we get lots of extra "kids" for meals several times over the week. They are all quite sporty so are generally "starving" after doing some kind of sport.
It's amazing how much extra has to go in your trolley.

[Nicos]

I already have everything I need apart from salad, cream and some fresh fruit.
Everything else is either already frozen, preserved or stored, or I can make.
I've written my menu for the 3days and there is surprisingly little on the shopping list

I bought the meat the other day. We're having turkey breast stuffed with duck breast, guinea fowel breast and quail breast, apricots and prunes, wrapped in guinea fowl skin and finely sliced bacon....all of which I will prepare tomorrow and then freeze ready for defrosting on Xmas Eve and cook on Xmas Day.

I even made my own chocolates this year by melting a block of chocolate, adding various flavours like chilli, chopped crystallised ginger, coconut etc then putting them in ice cube trays in the fridge.Didn't take long...and They've come out lovely!

I can't stand crowds of peeps nor queuing nor paying out stupid amounts of money on things I can easily make.
Wish we had yellow sticker days here!

[veggiechicken]

We're having turkey breast stuffed with duck breast, guinea fowel breast and quail breast, apricots and prunes, wrapped in guinea fowl skin and finely sliced bacon...
I can't stand ..........paying out stupid amounts of money on things I can easily make.

???easily make????
Sounds like a lot of work to me.

[Nicos]

One big slash in the chunk of turkey breast then stuff the rest of the meats in the pouch ...bit like a chicken Kiev!

Bit like a 4bird roast but just using the breast meat of the birds. (The rest of the birds we'll cook later in the year when we have more time and they will be a bit of a luxury!)

Probably take about 10 mins to make max...then freeze.Simples!

[veggiechicken]

I'll stick with opening a tin of beans and bunging some bread in the toaster.